The Lima Witch
by McAWrites
Summary: Quinn, Rachel, Santana, Brittany, Puck and Finn go camping in the woods on the 100th anniversary of the death of a legend.


Disclaimer: I do not own Glee, Slim Jim, Bear Grylls, Smokey the Bear or Walmart.

The Lima Witch

* * *

"Be careful out there, Quinnie, you know that tonight is the anniversary, don't you?" Quinn's mom calls out as the young cheerleader grabs her red duffle bag and starts for the front door.

Quinn rolls her eyes. Of course she knows it is the anniversary. The whole town has been obsessing about it for weeks now. They had even been talking about the events in history class at school.

"I really don't like the idea of you kids being alone out in those woods, especially tonight," Quinn's mom continues to fret. There is a honk from the vehicle waiting outside.

"We'll be fine, mom," Quinn groans, her hand twisting the knob on the door and pushing it open. "The Lima Witch's ghost isn't going to get us. That's all just a myth to draw in the extra tourists. Besides, if she does come after us, we'll just give her Rachel."

Quinn's mother frowns as she watches her daughter run down the steps and get into a truck with her friends.

* * *

"What took so long, Q?" Santana demands when Quinn climbs into the truck.

"Mom had to warn me about that old legend, you know, the Ghost of The Lima Witch? The one all of those banners down Main Street are about?"

"Oh yeah," Puck snaps his fingers when he remembers what Quinn is talking about, "The one who supposedly bewitched all of the men in Lima back in the 1600's to fall in love with her, and then boiled and ate the Mayor's intestines?"

"Sounds like she and Man-Hands back there have a lot in common," Santana snorts, pulling a Slim Jim from her backpack, she tears open the packaging and takes a bite.

"That's not very nice, San," Brittany protests gently at the same time as a disgruntled Finn shout's "Hey!" and as Rachel crosses her arms and speaks a quiet "I resent that."

Quinn laughs.

"It's all just a stupid legend."

Puck turns the truck down a dirt road leading into the woods. The twisted branches from the trees cast eerie shadows onto the road as dusk falls.

* * *

They reach their campsite just as the last of the sunlight falls below the tree line. The girls quickly set up the tents while the boys get to work trying to build a fire.

It isn't going very well. Puck is busily rubbing two sticks together while Finn uselessly tries to figure out how the Bear Grylls firestarter he picked up in the sporting goods department at Walmart is supposed to work. The four girls huddle together beneath a blanket.

"Idiots," Santana snarls, her breath visible in the brisk night air. She is shaking from the cold.

"Ladies," Rachel stutters, her teeth chattering as she speaks, "let this be a lesson to us all, if we always wait around for the men to take care of us, we'll starve to death." She produces a lighter and throws it at Finn's feet. The tall boy quickly snatches the item from the ground and uses it to light the pile of brush that had been collected hours ago.

"Really Berry?" Quinn stammers, suppressing a snort as the girls watch the guys use dried grass to build the small fire, "You've had that thing this whole time and you've just sat there letting the guys make fools of themselves?"

"Well," Rachel quips, "They're just so good at it."

The fire finally ready, the group begins to roast hotdogs. Well; Finn, Quinn, Puck, Santana and Brittany roast hotdogs. Rachel eats a peanut butter sandwich.

* * *

As the night progresses, the group re-seats themselves as couples. Brittany next to Santana, Rachel next to Finn, and Quinn next to Puck for old time's sake.

"I'm going to use the little girl's bush," Brittany declares, stretching as she stands up from the bench that she had been sitting on for several hours.

"Don't forget to take the biodegradable toilet paper," Rachel calls after the Cheerio from her own position, nuzzled beneath Finn's arm.

When Puck finishes his story about the fire-breathing goat man that supposedly lives under the gym at the high school, Quinn begins The Tale of the Ghost of The Lima Witch. It being the one hundredth anniversary of her death after all, it seemed like the appropriate story to tell around a campfire. As she reaches the part where the townspeople chase the witch into the very woods that the kids are in now, Santana interrupts.

"Brit has been gone for a while, you guys don't think she got lost, do you?" the group looks at one another, this is Brittany they are talking about.

"Maybe the Lima Witch's Ghost got her," Finn suggests lamely. Santana punches him in the arm.

"Don't even joke about that," she snarls with a glare.

"We should look for her," Puck decides, standing and stretching his legs. Finn stands as well. "Quinn, you and Rachel should stay here by the fire incase Brittany comes back while we're gone."

The pair of girls in question nod and the rest of the group, toting flashlights, move off into the trees; each one of them shouting the name of their missing friend.

"All of these trees look the same," they hear Santana shout as the search party moves further and further away from the campsite.

* * *

Now huddled together with Rachel on the same bench beneath two blankets; Quinn stares at the fire feeling its warmth and watching the flames dance up towards the sky. It really is beautiful, she thinks as she tries to remember each and every color and shape that she sees so that she can record it in her journal when she gets home in the morning. She feels Rachel shift beside her and looks over to see what the other girl is doing. The smaller girl is staring intensely at a dark corner of the clearing. Quinn can't see past the tree line.

"What are you looking at?" she asks.

"Nothing," Rachel answers quickly, shaking her head. Both girls are silent for a while and Quinn has begun to turn her attention back to the fire; when Rachel suddenly leaps to her feet, throwing the blankets off of herself, and grabs a branch from the fire. She swings it towards the corner she had been staring at just as Brittany steps out of the trees.

"Damn it Berry," Quinn complains, startled by the sudden movements. She hadn't noticed Brittany yet. "You could have started a forest fire."

"Only you can prevent forest fires," Brittany agrees in a serious voice. Quinn whips her head around.

"Brit...What happened? Santana, Puck and Finn are all out looking for you."

Rachel looks up from her phone where she is furiously texting Santana so that she can watch Brittany's face when she answers the question.

"I got lost," the girl explains with a shiver. "All of these trees look the same and I kept making wrong turns. It's okay though, this really nice old lady helped me find my way back."

"Brit, what old lady?" Quinn asks hesitantly as Rachel resumes her text to Santana and the boys urging them to hurry.

"She's right-," Brittany glances over her right shoulder and Quinn strains to see what the other girl is looking for. She thinks she might have seen a flash of something white disappear into the dark of the forest. Brittany shrugs. "She was there a minute ago."

Quinn glances back at Rachel, her eyes wide.

"No way," the shorter girl mouths, shaking her head violently.

"Britt!" they all hear Santana shriek as the Latina re-enters the clearing and races to pull her girlfriend into her arms.

The boys stand back taking in the scene; Quinn wearing a wide-eyed look on her face as though she'd seen a ghost, Rachel still holding the burning tree branch in front of herself like a weapon, and Brittany, now wrapped around Santana, looking as serene as ever. It was very peculiar.

* * *

The girls don't offer any explanations and eventually return to the benches around the fire. Rachel puts her branch back in its rightful spot and this time takes the seat next to Quinn. Santana holds on to Brittany as tightly as she can without hurting the other girl, and Puck and Finn sit together as Quinn restarts the story she had been telling before Brittany had wandered off. Every once in a while they would glance over at the darkest corner of the campsite as though they were looking for something, something that was likely the source of a dark shadow moving along the periphery of vision, or the cause of a twig snapping somewhere off in the distance, or perhaps the culprit behind an eerie feeling of being watched...

END

* * *

A/n: Just my first ghost story, no big deal. Reviews?


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